Virgin Lands Campaign 799665 224077535 2008-07-07T05:28:37Z Lightbot 7178666 Units/dates/other {{Refimprove|date=July 2007}} <!-- Commented out because image was deleted: [[Image:Virgin Lands by F. Malaev.jpeg|frame|right|"Virgin Lands" by [[Fedor Malaev]], a romanticised view of the Campaign|{{deletable image-caption|1=Thursday, 10 January 2008}}]] --> The '''Virgin Lands Campaign''' was an initiative by [[Nikita Khrushchev]] to open up vast tracts of unseeded (virgin) [[steppe]] in the northern [[Kazakh SSR]] and the [[Altay Mountains|Altay]] region of the [[Russian SFSR]], started in 1954. In the first year of the programme, 190,000 km² were [[plough]]ed up, and in 1955, an extra 140,000 km² were ploughed. With all this new land, a vast number of people would need to be brought in from all over the [[Soviet Union]]: the [[Komsomol]] was charged with recruiting them. More than 300,000 people, mostly [[Ukrainians]] and [[Russians]], arrived in the Virgin Lands to begin new lives as [[farmer]]s. Hundreds of thousands of [[soldier]]s, [[student]]s and [[combine harvester]] operators would join them; however, these people would stay for only a year's [[harvest]]. By the end of the mass [[immigration]]s to the Virgin Lands, [[Slavic peoples|Slavs]] outnumbered [[Kazakh people|Kazakh]]s in many areas. The main town was renamed ''Tselinograd'', "Virgin Lands City" (today's [[Astana]]). For a brief time, Khrushchev inspired a [[communist]] zeal in the peoples of the Soviet Union, and concentrated that zeal on a task that, for an equally brief time, produced the expected results. ==The first harvest== The first harvest on the Virgin Lands, in 1956, was a stunning success. Of the 125 million [[tonne]]s of [[cereal|grain]] produced in the [[Soviet Union]] that year, more than half of it came from one eighth of the country. The Soviet Union was producing, [[per capita]], twice as much wheat as the [[Western world|West]]. The scheme was therefore considered to be a huge success, as it not only enabled the USSR to feed its people but also to prove to the world that the Communist way of life was "better". ==Failures== Nearly all of the [[collective farm]]s in the Virgin Lands grew one crop alone: [[wheat]]. By the 1960s, the [[soil]] had been drained of all its [[nutrient]]s beneficial to wheat. However, production of fertilizers in the USSR had increased during this period and so the loss of fertility was principally due to poor planning as the fertilizers were rarely available where they were needed. Before long, due to lack of any measures to prevent [[erosion]], much of that soil was simply being blown away by the [[wind]] to leave bare, useless steppe behind. In 1963, Kazakhstan was lashed by hurricanes and millions of hectares of soil were rendered unusable. Also, much of the crop that could be harvested was wasted, as there were not enough [[storage silo]]s, so it had to be thrown away. Furthermore, the Soviet infrastructure was unable to cope and so much of the grain produced did not reach the towns, which was where it was most needed. Therefore despite the initial success of the Virgin Lands Campaign, the Soviet Union was forced to buy 20 million tonnes of grain from [[Canada]] to meet its needs and avoid famine. This constituted a huge humiliation both for the USSR and for Khrushchev, who had boasted that the Soviet Union would oustrip US agriculutural production. [[Image:USSR Republics Numbered Alphabetically.png|thumb|right|200px|The former USSR, including Kazakhstan.]] ==Legacy== Even after the end of the campaign, [[Russians in Kazakhstan|about six million]] Russian and Ukrainian inhabitants remained in the [[Kazakh SSR]].<ref>[[BBC]]: [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/4420922.stm Russians left behind in Central Asia]</ref> Their number begun to decrease after the [[dissolution of the Soviet Union]], because of the [[emigration]] of the Slavs back to their respective countries. A [[minor planet]] [[2111 Tselina]] discovered in 1969 by [[Soviet Union|Soviet]] astronomer [[Tamara Mikhailovna Smirnova]] is named to commemorate the 25th anniversary of virgin soil development in the [[USSR]].<ref>{{cite book | last = Schmadel | first = Lutz D. | coauthors = | title = Dictionary of Minor Planet Names | pages = p. 171 | edition = 5th | year = 2003 | publisher = Springer Verlag | location = New York | url = http://books.google.com/books?q=2111+Tselina+UC | id = ISBN 3540002383}}</ref> ==See also== * [[Agriculture in the Soviet Union]] * [[Sovkhoz]] * [[Agriculture]] * [[Twenty-five-thousander]] ==References== <references/> [[Category:History of the Soviet Union and Soviet Russia]] [[Category:Agriculture in the Soviet Union]] [[Category:1954 establishments]] [[Category:1954 in the Soviet Union]] [[Category:Nikita Khrushchev]] [[bg:Овладяване на целината]] [[fr:Campagne des terres vierges]] [[nl:Maagdelijke-grondencampagne]] [[no:Jomfrulandplanen]] [[nn:Jomfrulandplanen]] [[ru:Освоение целины]]